Healthy Eating: The Quick and Easy Way!

Nobody has time these days to be spending a lot of time in the kitchen preparing elaborate healthy meals from scratch. We live in a fast paced society where everybody’s in a hurry. And food manufacturers have taken advantage of this. With everything from instant breakfast beverages to microwave meals, high tech convenience foods, fast food and over-processed just about everything you find in a package or can, it’s no wonder that our society is confused about what healthy food really is. The food manufacturers have masterfully fooled the masses into believing that their high tech, convenient, sugar-free, fat-free, food-free concoctions of chemicals are healthy substitutes for real, whole food. Even the products that start out with real food are so over-processed and full of chemical additives that there is little nutritional value to them.

So, how do you eat healthfully and conveniently in this fast-paced world we live in? Most people don’t have the time or don’t choose to take the time to prepare elaborate whole food meals from scratch. But preparing healthy meals doesn’t have to be a lengthy, time consuming process.

First, let’s look at why it’s important to eat healthy food. Your body is a unique, complex fine-tuned machine. And like any machine, it needs the proper care and maintenance to function optimally. If you put water or soda in the gas tank of your car, your car wouldn’t run. Your body needs the same kind of attention you give your car. It needs the proper fuel to run efficiently.

If you don’t take care of your car and it breaks down beyond repair, you can always buy a new car. But if you don’t take care of your body and it breaks down and gets sick or diseased, you can’t get a new body. So why take the risk!

To truly attain a state of real health, you have to feed your body the right kind of fuel. Here are the three keys to healthy eating:

1. Eat the right kinds of foods to

• supply your body with healthy proteins, carbohydrates and fats
• get the vitamins and minerals your body needs

2. Eliminate or minimize the use of foods

• that have been sprayed with pesticides
  
• that contain food additives
  
• that have been highly processed
  
• that have been irradiated or have irradiated ingredients
• that have been genetically modified

3. Drink plenty of "good" water.

Eating healthfully doesn’t have to be a time consuming process.
Choose fresh whole fruits and vegetables, organic if possible. Select brown rice, millet or other whole grains instead of white rice. Eat flourless, sprouted grain or yeast-free whole grain sourdough breads instead of breads made from enriched or white flour. Buy dried beans or organic beans canned in water instead of canned beans prepared with animal fat, sweeteners and chemical additives. Purchase raw nuts and seeds instead of roasted or dry roasted. If you eat animal products, make sure they are from organically grass-fed animals that are hormone free and antibiotic free.

For your salad dressing, use extra virgin olive oil, raw unfiltered apple cider vinegar and Celtic Sea Salt® or your favorite herbs. Always avoid hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils. For snacks, have some fresh fruit, apple or banana slices with almond butter, celery or carrot sticks with nut butter or some organic raisins mixed with some raw nuts and seeds. For an occasional sweet treat, try almond butter or cashew butter on a half of a pitted date.

Remember, buy fresh whole foods. If you buy packaged food, read the label carefully. Make sure the ingredients are whole food ingredients and not chemical additives.

For more information on Healthy Eating, see HEALTHY EATING: For Extremely Busy People Who Don’t Have Time For It by Dr. Christine H. Farlow, D.C.